Well, the Australian Greens are at it again. With the removal of their last poll, the one asking about fascist gulags, over 4 in 5 votes registered with the Greens (82%) supported the continuation of the current government immigration policy. Now clearly this was yet another aberration by the Greens. They foolishly allowed an option that cogent, rational, sane readers would automatically opt for.

Understandably, the morons have removed this poll and instituted another pet project. It's a fascinating insight into the thinking behind the compilation of the question. Seeking to find collective justification for an attack on the concept of democracy, the Greens have devised a cunning set of responses to a question relating to impending Senate irrelevancy for the Greens. In fact, they haven't even created a set of loaded responses, just a one sided polemic with an array of supportive arguments. Specious arguments to justify a position against the will of the majority of Australian voters. It's time the blame is laid squarely at the feet of those responsible for giving this unbridled power to the government. The public.

It would be more realistic for the Greens to ask the question;

Q: Are the Australian voters that elected for conservative control of both houses of federal parliament,A: Stupid idiots,B: Dumb morons,C: Redneck arseholes,D: Ignorant lickspittles or,E: All of the above.

Go and visit the Greens. Watch what happens when a political party finds it impossible to be taken seriously and resorts to complete idiocy, starting tomorrow. Sorry, was thinking of the ALP there for a second.

Despite harsh images coming out of Iraq (and made to look even harsher by a traditional media elite determined to make Iraq another Vietnam), which had recruitment well behind schedule for much of the first half of this year, June saw a reversal in recruitment trends:

The U.S. Army, hard pressed to attract new soldiers amid the Iraq war, exceeded its monthly recruiting goal in June, ending four straight months of shortfalls, the top U.S. military officer said on Wednesday.

But the active-duty Army, three-quarters through fiscal 2005, remained 14 percent -- about 7,800 recruits -- behind its year-to-date target and was in danger of missing its first annual recruiting goal since 1999, officials said. Its goal for fiscal 2005, ending on Sept. 30, is 80,000 recruits.

"I will tell you that for the month of June, the United States Army active recruiting is over 100 percent of its goal, which is a turnaround from where they've been the last several months," Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told an audience of Pentagon employees.

"So there's a bit of good news in here. We'll see how it works out the rest of the year," Myers added.

Nonetheless, now that school is out, perhaps young men and women looking to serve their country will no longer be blinded by their teachers to the military option. In fact, that may be the greatest factor in explaining the uptick.

It's worth considering, too, that perhaps, with a war going on, our youngsters are thinking a little more thoroughly about what military service entails, instead of viewing it as simply an obligation-free way to pay for college or get out of the hood. Indeed, this deeper soul-searching makes each new warrior even more valuable, even in later civilian life, because he or she will have decided, more unequivocally than ever, that a life worth having (thanks to help from the government) is a life worth fighting, even dying, for.

British Youth Receiving Clear Guidance

CAIRO, June 28, 2005 (IslamOnline.net)? A British council has presented resource packs covering the basic teachings of Islam to primary schools across the London borough of Harrow in an effort to provide a better understanding of the Muslim faith, according to a local daily.

Harrow today, tomorrow the whole UK.

"The new resources will help school staff further develop their approach to high quality teaching of Islam -- a religion that is far too often misunderstood," the Harrow Times Monday, June 27, quoted as saying Councilor Navin Shah, leader of Harrow borough Council, which has become the first to fully fund the teaching of Islam in primary schools.

As disgusting as it is that unsuspecting children will be exposed to this terrorist propaganda, what is even more disgusting is the reaction of leftists.

Or more correctly, the lack of it.

Don't you see, you leftist scum? They are teaching religion in school! Aren't you useless pieces of human filth always on about what a travesty it is to be teaching religion in public schools since Church and State must be separate?

Oh I see. That is only when it is Christianity and Judaism being taught. Not when it is the lies of your terrorist allies being taught.

Can someone tell me why we don't have a sanctioned leftist hunting season? Seriously, I am having real trouble in thinking of any reason we need leftists infesting and polluting our society.

Today Tonight - one of the worst "current affairs" shows in history was on a role with leftist dipshits tonight with not one but two stories illustrating the stupidity of said leftists.

The first story hinted at a devious and secret conspiracy by food companies to rip you, the clueless consumer, off. But as with the telecommunications non-conspiracy, it was another load of leftist crap. It turns out the food companies have been using a concept that is so ultra top secret it is only taught in first year marketing and psychology classes all over the world - namely the Just Noticeable Difference! [insert shocking, dramatic music]

Essentially (in this case), food companies will try to gradually reduce the size of their products, always keeping the change below the point where consumers will realise the size has changed. It has been going on for years - biscuits, burgers, toilet paper, bread, paper towels, tissues, sponges, cereals, chocolates - you name it. You will be hard pressed to find a product that hasn't decreased in size or quantity while prices have gone up.

That reminds me. What was that thing called? You know, the gradual increase in prices over time.....oh that's right! It's called inflation, and not "evil and devious and profiteering by the equally evil and greedy food companies" or whatever the leftist dipshits were trying to call it.

The next story featured was about the Parents Jury, a group of people who seemed to have the right idea but skew away at the last moment down the path of leftist dipshitism. They want safer environments for their kids (as we all do), they want healthy choices in school canteens (those choices should be there), they want kids to do more exercise (hell, that needs to be the case).

Three ticks, but then, just when I think this might not be a story about leftist dipshitism..... they try to shift the blame for it all to the advertising of junk food and give out awards to the advertisements they deem as having the most detrimental effect.

BZZZZZT!

"Oh I am sorry, but trying to pass the buck on your parental responsibilities and blaming television, advertising, junk food companies, well....anyone but yourselves really, for YOU failing to control YOUR child's diet, is an incorrect answer and a definite trait of a leftist dipshit. But let's see what we have as a consolation prize."

I have already explained how to deal with your children should they see something on television and then start bugging you for it. Read the article and you will see it is the same way my mother dealt with me when I kept bugging her for McDonald's or icecream or chocolate or chips or whatever junk food I would be asking for. The article also contains the only piece of information you need to stop you children eating junk food. (For the leftist dipshits, it is the bit in large font that is underlined and bright pink in colour)

Now some may be saying "But that doesn't help the child understand why they shouldn't be eating junk food." That's right - it doesn't. But you know something.....

IT DOESN'T NEED TO! THEY ARE CHILDREN! THEY DON'T CARE ABOUT UNDERSTANDING IT!

Once they are in their teens and old enough to start making their own choices, then by all means, explain everything you want to them. It is more important for children to behave properly that it is for them to understand why they need to behave properly.

My mother would try and explain to me about getting fat and how it can lead to making me sick and unhealthy and how when I got older I could have heart attacks. And guess what? As a kid of seven years old I DIDN'T CARE! I wasn't fat, I was rarely sick, and I thought the age where I would need to be worried about heart attacks would never come, it was so far away from me.

So my mother took it upon herself to, you know, BE A PARENT, and say NO when I asked for junk food and also make sure I ate healthy foods. I didn't like it at the time but mum was mum so I did what I was told.

Once I got older, old enough to make my own choices about what I ate, once I started looking at the effects of obesity in Health class, once my metabolism start slowing and the kilos starting appearing, then I began to understand why my mother was so insistent that I eat right and not have junk food all the time.

Taking responsibility for your children by saying NO when they ask for junk food and making sure they eat right and get plenty of exercise is something you leftist dipshits really should try before blaming someone else.

More: i found this apalling story about the Australian hostage Douglas Wood at Andi's World. It shouldn't shock me, yet somehow it does.

It seems that lunacy isn't exclusive to American journalists. After Douglas Woods, the Australian contractor kidnapped in Iraq, was freed from captivity, he actually expressed his true feelings for his captors by calling them a**holes. These remarks have drawn the ire of one Andrew Jaspan, editor of a left-wing newspaper in Australia.

Jaspan tells us that Woods went way too far with his remarks:

Said Jaspan: "I was, I have to say, shocked by Douglas Wood's use of the a---hole word, if I can put it like that, which I just thought was coarse and very ill-thought through and I think demeans the man and is one of the reasons why people are slightly sceptical of his motives and everything else.

Woods greatest sin was to say "God Bless America" and praise American and Iraqi forces. Apparently, Jaspan thinks Woods should have been more grateful to his captors and a little less grateful to the forces who freed him. After all, his captors didn't torment him too badly.

Well, unless you count kidnapping him, kicking him in the head, keeeping him blindfolded and bound for 47 days, shaving him bald, killing two of his colleagues, making him beg for his life, and -- according to Hjertstrom -- shooting several other prisoners in front of him.

Wow. What is wrong with the far left? And how can anyone on God's earth take them seriously? It makes me want to bang my head against a wall sometimes.

Yes, he did not do as did SBS journalist and Left hero John Martinkus after his own brief captivity and declare his kidnappers were "not savages", and say Iraq was 'on the road to s---'.

INSTEAD, he roared 'God bless America' and praised the US-trained Iraqi soldiers -- Iraq's real freedom fighters -- who saved him, saying he was 'proof positive that the current policies of the American and Australian governments is the right one'.

It seems that to a Leftist, this makes Wood the boorish inferior of the killers who beat him and held him captive. It is why journalist Tracee Hutchinson, in an Age column, calls him a 'blustering buffoon', moaning: 'It was enough that his words God bless America had been played over and over on his release.'

Let me ask younger readers still deciding on their brand of politics. Wouldn't you blush to join this Left?

If you missed Sheikh Hilarity on SBS Dateline, check out the transcript (no streaming video yet)- it's funnier than a busload of asylum-seeker supporters going off a cliff and landing on a whale mass stranding:-

GEORGE NEGUS: So you don’t hold the Australians responsible at all for what happened, the way Douglas Woods was rescued, let alone the death now of one of the Iraqis as we hear?

SHEIK TAJ EL-DIN AL-HILALY, (Translation): No, no I don’t, what happened exactly, is that some Iraqi police officers or the National Guard, were conducting a search and stumbled on someone. Oh, who’s this? Douglas. And Rambo, the American forces thank you very much, took him, and that is what happened.

GEORGE NEGUS: But you don't really blame anyone? It was an unfortunate set of circumstances.

SHEIK TAJ EL-DIN AL-HILALY, (Translation): No, up till now I have no information of betrayal, till now.

So the rescue of an Australian citizen with no allied casualties is an unfortunate set of circumstances and a betrayal, requiring the assignment of blame. (Snicker snicker.)

GEORGE NEGUS: Does this mean the captor, the insurgents, the people who captured Douglas Wood and these two Iraqi gentlemen just can't be trusted.

SHEIK TAJ EL-DIN AL-HILALY, (Translation): After the raid, contact stopped, the raid has had bad consequences.

GEORGE NEGUS: Do you think Douglas Wood was wise to describe his captors as, to use a dreadful Australian term, arseholes?

SHEIK TAJ EL-DIN AL-HILALY, (Translation): Douglas Wood doesn’t know his head from his feet, the poor guy should be excused, because he needs a new program…… he needs to be re-programmed to become a new person. We are trying to build bridges between the Iraqi nation and its people and the Australian nation, Australian society. We have built many bridges and established good relations for the future. Such talk is irresponsible and very dangerous. It affects the relationship and any future work, involving Australian interests in Iraq.

So the raid had bad consequences? Sure did for the terrorists; Wood didn't know what he was saying, though, what with not knowing his head from his feet. Another day or two and his head would have been rolling around his feet. Once they had it off, I'm sure his captors could have done a re-progamming job like billy-o. (Chortle, guffaw).

Having allowed the tubanned turd to snork on for about twenty minutes of utter bollocks, George Fungus nailed him in the epilogue, to cover SBS's arse which has been hanging in the breeze for days over their dodgy reportage of this whole episode:-

GEORGE NEGUS: Sheik Hilaly - understandably emotional on hearing the news of the death of the two Iraqis taken hostage with Douglas Wood. A high-level local intermediary writing off the raid by Iraqi forces as a 'fabrication', and claiming the two innocent Iraqis had been killed after the Baghdad raid when earlier we confirmed with the family that they died before the raid. Whatever else, our evening with the sheik reinforced how murky the truth can be in the murderous mess that is Iraq.

Not as murky as your idea of journalistic integrity, George. (Laughs like drain).

Our resident cartoonist GP sums it up pretty well:-

Oops- there is streaming video here- it will make you day. (It's also repeated today 23/6 at 1300, which is about now).

Also featured was a beat-up on supposed Orwellian supression of truth (and a shameless cross-promo for Truth, Lies and Intelligence, another documentary on Iraq made by public-fund hoover and dingbat Carmen Travers, to air tonight), where ASIO/ONA goons descended on upstanding citizens like Robert Manne, Carmel Travers and Andrew Wilke to scan their computers for any confidential information swiped by Wilke when he resigned (why he's never been charged by the feds under the Crimes Act is beyond me), and in the event of data being discovered the hard drives were trashed.

What's particularly Orwellian about this story is that Australia's intelligence agencies have sweeping new powers that can prevent any reporting of incidents like these. The new laws are designed specifically to target people who are not suspects but merely have information that might be of interest to national security. We and the people we've spoken to have had to take extensive legal advice before proceeding. These new anti-terrorism laws hang like the sword of Damocles over anyone who becomes caught up in the world of national security. In this case, no warrants were issued under the ASIO act as everyone agreed to the cleansing. If they had resisted, they could have faced possibly five years in jail, and even talking about the fact that the cleansing had taken place would have been a crime.

Note use of the term cleansing- a term never used by the officers involved, but a creation of SBS to add a sinister air to the operation.

There's much talk of jail, and supression, but no-one's been charged, much less banged up, and they're yammering freely about the whole thing on a broadcaster funded by the government.

How much more of this jackbooted thuggery can we tolerate?

These munchkins live in their own little paranoid fantasy world, don't they?

Two Christian pastors convicted of thought crimes in the state of Victoria have announced that they will go to jail rather than give up their rights.

Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT) deputy president Michael Higgins ordered two pastors of an evangelical order, Catch the Fire Ministry, to apologise for comments they made in a speech, on a website and in a newsletter.

In a landmark ruling, the tribunal found Muslims were vilified by claims that Muslims were training to take over Australia, encouraging domestic violence and that Islam was an inherently violent religion.

The case was the first to be heard by VCAT since the Racial and Religious Tolerance Act took effect in Victoria at the start of 2002.

Outside the tribunal, Danny Nalliah – one of the pastors taken to VCAT by the Islamic Council – described himself as a martyr and said he would go to jail before apologising.

"Right from the inception, we have said that this law is a foul law, this law is not a law which brings unity," Pastor Nalliah said.

"It causes disunity and as far as we are concerned right from the beginning we have stated we will not apologise.

"We will go to prison for standing for the truth and not sacrifice our freedom and freedom to speak."

This challenge brings the prospect that the two could become Australia's only political prisoners if both sides refuse to back down. Numerous groups, both religious and non-religious, are campaigning aganist the controversial and oppressive legislation.

Free speech is an inalienable right, and the Victorian government's use of political censorship to suppress dissent should be protested by everyone who supports democracy and human rights. This is an issue on which compromise cannot be tolerated.

But watch the Left (and the Left-wing MSM) ignore this in their droves.

LITERATURE filled with hatred of Christians, Jews and non-Muslims is being soldat a mosque near a Melbournehome raided by ASIO.

Books sold at the store attached to the Brunswick mosque tell Muslims they should "hate and take as enemies" non-Muslims, reject Jews and Christians, and learn to hate in order to properly love Allah. The texts say Muslims should learn military tactics and suggest that if a person speaks ill of Islam it is acceptable to kill them.

They urge Muslims to strike back against "the barbaric onslaught from their enemies -- the Jews, Christians, atheists, secularists[Yes, Lefties - that means you. . . Ed.] and others".

Pages are devoted to legitimising episodes of violence against Jews who insult Islam.

"A Jewish woman used to abuse the Prophet and disparage him. A man strangled her till she died. The Apostle of Allah declared that no recompense was payable for her blood," one book recounts. A similar example is given of a man killing the mother of his two children because she "disparaged the Prophet"; he also was declared clear of any crime.

And yet two Christian Pastors were found guilty and sentenced in Victoria only this week, of vilifying Islam because they quoted exactly this kind of crap from the Koran. Make no mistake, though, these are not Koranic texts. This is your standard Muslim fare.

Readers are instructed by the books not to feel compassion for non-Muslims, not to trust them, and not to speak well of them. One book says faithful Muslims should learn military tactics.

The group of books were bought from the bookstore of the Islamic Information and Support Centre of Australia, which is in the same building as the Brunswick mosque. One, The Ideological Attack, describes "the Jews" as striving to corrupt the beliefs, morals and manners of Muslims.

"The Jews scheme and crave after possessing the Muslim lands, as well as the lands of others," it reads.

"Supported by a demonic global plan as well as unlimited financial backing, this attack aims at domination and hegemony over the Islamic world; dividing it, attacking it culturally and morally and perverting the true image of the religion. "Therefore it is amongst the priorities of the Islamic call (da'wah) to break this attack and to counter it with every legitimate means of da'wah possible."

One text says of devotion to Allah: "As regards hatred for His sake this is an essential prerequisite for loving Him."

A book on "Muslims Living as Minorities" mentions Muslims fighting in Afghanistan and discusses "jihad", or holy war, as a collective and individual responsibility.

Another quotes classic anti-Semitic conspiracy text The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, stating Jews want to make Muslims "the ass of the chosen people".

Those responsible for these murder-inciting texts should be denounced. In fact, I'd not mind in the least if they were stripped of their Australian citizenship and deported. This needs to start happening.

We also cannot afford to allow the Left to continue to shelter this scourge; to continue to pretend it's not happening and/or (when forced to admit it is) that it's all the fault of evil 'racists'* (like me, no doubt).

Someone is going to get killed here. The problem is (and especially given the loathing heaped on Douglas Wood this last week), I fear many on the Left simply can't wait for that to happen.

Many highly visible members of the Democratic Party have, over the last few years, been more than ready to dish out venom and abuse, not only on their political opponents, but also on our men and women in uniform, who as an organization have not taken sides in the political wrangly. But, when called out on their own remarks, they are plenty eager to ignore the challenge and cast aspersions on the challenger.

Thus, after Senator Durbin referred to American soldiers as akin to the Nazis and Pol Pot, and stolidly refused to apologize for having made the comments (and only for people having been offended), the Democrats now are demanding the head of Karl Rove for criticizing the Democrats' response to the 9/11 attacks:

Rove, in a speech Wednesday evening to the New York state Conservative Party just a few miles north of Ground Zero, said, "Liberals saw the savagery of the 9/11 attacks and wanted to prepare indictments and offer therapy and understanding for our attackers." Conservatives, he said, "saw the savagery of 9/11 and the attacks and prepared for war."

He added that the Democratic Party made the mistake of calling for "moderation and restraint" after the terrorist attacks.

During the 2004 campaign, Bush dismissed the notion of negotiating with terrorists and said, "You can't sit back and hope that somehow therapy will work and they will change their ways."

So, it's alright and defensible for Democrats not only to disagree with the Administration's policies, but also to denigrate and demonize any and all who agree with any portion of that policy, castigating them as the reincarnation of Hitler; but if anybody so much as criticizes the Democrats for their reactions, suddenly the Democrats have such thin skin?

Don't think the Democrats have been behaving awfully rudely? Captain Ed has more on the thick-skinned Party of the Jackass (hey, I didn't choose their mascot) and its tendency to become extremely thin-skinned when its own are being criticized.

I know the media doesn't use the word "terrorists", and instead prefers "insurgency", but here's a NYT piece on the terrorists with some interesting news:

U.S. marines watching the skyline from their second-story perch in an abandoned house here saw a curious thing: In the distance, mortar rounds and gunfire popped, but the volleys did not seem to be aimed at them.

In the dark, one marine spoke in hushed code words on a radio, and after a minute found the answer. "Red on red," he said late Sunday night, using a military term for enemy-on-enemy fire.

Marines patrolling this desert region near the Syrian border have for months been seeing a strange trend in the complex Iraqi insurgency. Insurgents, they say, have been fighting one another in this constellation of towns along the Euphrates, from Husayba to Qaim. The observations offer a new clue in the hidden world of the insurgency and suggest that there may have been, as American commanders suggest, a split between Islamic militants and local rebels.

A United Nations official who served in Iraq last year and who consulted widely with militant groups said by telephone that there had been a split for some time.

"There is a rift," said the official, who requested anonymity. "I'm certain that the nationalist Iraqi part of the insurgency is very much fed up with the jihadists' grabbing the headlines and carrying out the sort of violence that they don't want against innocent civilians."

While Tim Blair notes that this "might be as close as we get to Paul McGeough’s predicted civil war", think of the possibilities here.

A movie called Jihadist Vs Terrorist. We've had Alien Vs Predator, Boa Vs Python, Freddy Vs Jason, and many, many more. Why not pit these two explosive characters against each other.

We're going to need a tagline (something cheesy always works), a lead Jihadist, a lead Terrorist (I recommend this guy) and a bunch of American soldiers. The plot is pretty much worked out for us - angry terrorists get pissed off at even angrier jihadists, and begin to use their vast array of French, German and Chinese weapons and explosives on each other.

Okay, so I laughed when I read James Taranto's item mocking Andrew Sullivan. Why? Because it's true: Andrew can be a little excitable at times, and goes with whatever the headlines are saying, pretty much. Mind, not that I expect bloggers always to be breaking news; the nature of the medium pretty much ensures that most issues bloggers (as opposed to the diarists at LiveJournal, xanga.com, or Pitas.com) will be mostly reacting to headlines, i.e., the MSM still sets the agenda, for the most part. Andrew is no different, really, in this respect.

However, Andrew does have a tendency to get a little bit excitable, especially where it comes to his pet issues. His ideals are most laudable, but when human beings fall short of his ideals, he is quite willing to skewer them. Naturally, since the Bush Administration is composed of human beings who are in the spotlight all the time, it takes no genius to cite a litany of grievances against their policies. Andrew, by dint of his passions, is wont to take such things personally, and extends this lack of courtesy also to fellow bloggers.

Take, for instance, his hyperventilating reaction to Glenn Reynold's use of the term "wing-wang" in discussing the issue of Lincoln's sexual orientation. Seems to me that Andrew still isn't comfortable enough with his sexuality to differentiate between flippant insouciance and real homophobia.

Also take a look at Andrew's coverage of the 2004 presidential campaign. His dissatisfaction with the Bush Administration's policies, while understandable and worth debating on its own merits, morphed into support for an opportunist like John Kerry. Andrew's position: We can't do worse than return Bush to the White House. Fine, so far. And anyone who disagrees with me supports torture!

Those of us who persevere in reading Andrew's blog have not been in doubt for the past year and a half (incidentally, right after he started taking up sponsorship) that Andrew has become much, much more excitable. Where he was once a voice of reason not unlike Christopher Hitchens (minus the rather entertaining bombast), he is now not much different than some of the Lefties he has been reading lately. Occasionally, a beam of calm meditation shines through the cloud that his blog has become, and he can patiently discuss, in a reasonable manner, what policies he likes and dislikes. But touch on anything emotional and Andrew flies off the handle.

There's a word we have for friends that can be a little emotional like that: excitable.

How is any of this spin? How is any of it illogical or internally incoherent? How is any of it "excitable", unless it is somehow now unacceptable to be shocked to the core by what we have discovered about the treatment of many detainees by U.S. forces? There is a distinction between how we deal with the enemy in the field of battle and how we deal with prisoners of war captured in such a battle. You can be ruthless in the former and humane in the latter. In fact, this was once the defining characteristic of the Western way of war. Now it is a subject of mockery from the defend-anything-smear-anyone right.

Poor Andrew is so infuriated by any perceived besmirchment that he doesn't take the time to read how James Taranto (who of late is arguably a more consistent reader than Glenn) emphasized certain phrases within the entire body of quotations from Andrew's own writings. Considering how often Andrew, like any other blogger, takes public figures to task for infelicitous choices of diction, you'd think he'd be more chastened and publish a clarification of his positions than to swipe at erstwhile supporters.

In a way, he reminds me of the depiction of John Adams. He's got a pretty good grasp of the big picture, but he is exceedingly excitable, and prone to interpret disagreements with his words as attacks on his character. His sexuality and his ideological bent don't help him. He's shunned by the Left for having dared to support a war prosecuted by a Republican Administration; he's shunned by the Right for his social liberalism; and many in the middle, who share many of his views, become alienated as he moves beyond rhetoric on his pet issues, and into hyperventilation.

In this post, I looked at how an AAP stringer couldn't tell the difference between a piece of legislation called Voluntary Student Unionism and outlawing student unions. The AAP first par went as such:

THE nation's peak university body has told the Federal Government its legislation banning student union fees will threaten thousands of jobs as well as key sport, health and welfare services.

National Party senators are threatening to block the Federal Government’s legislation to outlaw student unions, potentially derailing one of the Prime Minister’s ideological ambitions.

This is twice in four days. Not just a one-off mistake. The last piece from the Herald got through at least two journalists and one sub-editor, and they didn't think to clear up the huge factual deficiency in the very first sentence?

And people wonder why I'm instantly skeptical of any Sydney Morning Herald piece.

Unfortunately, any sympathy he might have gotten from me by sharing my favorite junk food obsession, he relinquished by calling Dan Rather "a good guy."

But also, Saddam apparently likes to relax in prison by writing poetry among other things. i'm terribly curious to read his poetry, but i imagine it will be a long time before i see any of it published.

So in the interim, i've written some poems that, while they were not written by the Butcher of Baghdad, i could imagine him having written some things very similar during a reflective moment behind bars.

I wish I had a candle and a fine woman.These finer things are meant for men like me.Not meant for kurd-man, shiite or the jew-man,whom i buried in mass graves o’er by that tree.You understand what women give to me,but wherefor say I candle? Do you ask?To know how waxen tapers meet my need,picture me, Uday, and my friend monsieur Jacques.T’was many years ago, on a debauchin London’s town or was it Amsterdam’s?We caught a sex show -- wonderment to watch.This chick had knockers like two great big hams.Now what I’m ‘bout to tell you, keep hush-hush.She did things with that candle made me blush.

Twelve French peacekeepers are due to be charged with stealing money from a bank in Ivory Coast, which they were supposed to be guarding last year. Some allegedly bought digital cameras and mobile phones with the money and sent them to their families in France.

They are alleged to have stolen the equivalent of about $100,000 from the bank in the western town of Man.

They were part of a 4,000-strong French force sent to restore order in Ivory Coast after a rebellion began in 2002.

Six other French soldiers have been accused of stealing nearly $20,000 worth of local CFA francs from another branch of the Central Bank of West African States (BCEAO) in the rebel headquarters of Bouake last year.

TONY EASTLEY: Last month Sydney cleric Sheikh Taj El Din Al Hilali was in Iraq trying to negotiate with the hostage takers. The Sheikh is currently in Cairo where last night he told SBS Radio that his efforts had led to Douglas Wood's freedom.

TAJ EL DIN AL HILALI: My mission is successful. Douglas Wood is alive and free. I would like to thank the honest Iraqis who helped me secure the release of Douglas Wood.

What a disgusting sycophant. The 63-year-old engineer said he had never heard of the Mufti of Australia, Sheikh Taj Aldin Alhilali, during his hostage ordeal.

So exactly what did Shake-N-Bake Hillbilly do in Iraq then? Clearly, not much.

Well, it’s official, just shriek ‘refugee’ and you’re in (and aren't the lefties all falling over themselves over this one)!

Yes, thanks to that useless sack of treacherous rubbish (mister ‘safe seat’ himself), Petro Georgiou, who’s done bugger all for anyone much - ever - the ‘open door’ is once again very much in business. Yep’, all you have to do is bring in a child and say ‘refugee’, (who cares the grounds, because after all, why would you lie about something like that), and you’re in. Safe as houses.

Rebel, huh? 'Swine' is more like it. But let’s see how rebellious (and happy) you are if the comfy seat of Kooyong gets pulled from under your rather ample ass, hey, Petro? Seriously, this guy needs to lose preselection – immediately. Because if this is all he’s good for, then he needs to be pissed off as quickly as possible.

I’m sick to death of the lies being peddled here; the notion that Australia gratuitously locks up refugees. Australia doesnot lock up refugees. By population, Australia is one of the largest welcomers of refugees on the face of the globe. Australia locks up peoplewho arriveuninvited,without travel documents, or whooverstay their visas and won't leave. That’s it. And just because someone screams ‘refugee’ when faced with the boot ('oh, but why would they lie') doesn’t mean they are (but just try telling that to your average, jack-boot lefty).

But enough of this.

Quite clearly, the only way to respond to this BS, once and for all, is to commence an immediate campaign to tighten Australia’s visa regulations, and particularly when it comes to high-risk nationalities (and you can stick your ‘racism’ tags where the Sun don’t shine. I even made it easy for you: check out the pretty red).

And when I say ‘tighten’, I’m suggesting something akin to an Eagle's ass in a power dive.

Here are just a few suggestions (feel free to add a few of your own):

Q: You have one or more children you wish to bring into our country on holiday with you? Yes?A: Dear God, will someone turn off those alarms! No. No child visas; no exceptions. We’ll consider you, but your kids stay at home while you’re on ‘holiday’. Don’t like it? Try France. I hear the Riviera is nice.

Q: You have relatives living here with whom you wish to visit? Yes?A: Sorry – you can just forget the whole deal right there.

Q: You have elderly relatives back home and to whom you are the only relations? Yes?A: Woohoo – you must be kidding! Piss off out of our Consulate immediately!

Q: You have large assets (provable) back home, in the form of bricks and mortar, and which you would entirely forfeit were you not to return? Yes?A: We’ll give that one some thought. . .

Update: scuttlebut has it that Petro might be facing some challengers, with a number of contenders looking to take him on over preselection. Good. The man is completely useless to his electorate (just ask them - any of them), and even more useless to us.

During Kiss Of The Dragon, the corrupt, high-ranking French police officer Richard states "There is a time for diplomacy and a time for action. Diplomacy is dead." That statement rang true when Australian hostage in Iraq, Douglas Wood, was rescued by Iraqi forces today. Our Prime Minister had the following to say:

Mr Speaker, I am delighted to inform the House that the Australian hostage in Iraq, Mr Douglas Wood, is safe from his captors.

Mr Wood was recovered a short while ago in Baghdad in a military operation that I'm told was conducted by Iraqi forces, in cooperation in a general way with force elements of the United States.

That sounds like a rescue, yet the pro-insurgency media decided to run reports like this one from Reuters:

Australian hostage Douglas Wood was freed by Iraqi and U.S. forces after six weeks in captivity, Australia's prime minister said on Wednesday.

But the latest in a recent series of successful operations to release foreigners kidnapped in Iraq was overshadowed by yet another suicide bomb attack on Iraqi security forces, this time at an army mess hall, in which at least 23 were killed.

A variety of news outlets claimed Wood was "released", a line which Australian Grand Mufti Sheikh al-Hilali would love to go along with:

The Australian Federation of Islamic Councils says the sheik, or Grand Mufti as he is also known, knew as early as 2am (AEST) today that Mr Wood had been released by the insurgents who kidnapped him in early May.

Sure you did. We believe you. At least al-Hilali had most of his reputation left in tact after he went to Iraq (twice), tried to negotiate the release of Wood through a variety of methods, and left when he felt he did all he could (which was a lot). But to try and take the credit of the Iraqi security forces is low.

Diplomacy was tried, but it failed. Action was taken, and it succeeded. Sounds just like the 12-year road to liberating Iraq.

An insight into the shocking world of Guantanamo Bay interrogators has emerged with publication of the ultra-secret log of their treatment of a prominent detainee.

In the first detailed official record of how the United States extracts information from terrorist suspects, the document chronicles 50 days of questioning of Mohammed al-Qahtani, a diehard follower of Osama bin Laden.

Among its more eye-catching disclosures is the account of how Qahtani had water poured on his head and pop music blared into his cell to keep him awake during all-night sessions.

Dear God!!! Water? Poured? And music? Pop music?

My eyes are caught!

Of course, had that been moi, the water in question would have been approaching temperatures rivalling that of the surface of the Sun, and the music – well, let’s put it this way, how loud is 300,000 decibels?

The log highlights a range of bizarre approaches used to try to make "Detainee 063" crack.

Truly bizarre? Like feeding a live octopus into his rectum? Flapping his ears backwards and forwards fast enough to generate a stiff breeze? Attaching him to an industrial slapping machine? Filling his cell with sheep’s bladders and artichokes? Pumping a plague of genetically-engineered locusts up his nose? Or the old MI6 standard: a flock of Peruvian Archer bats in ski masks (don’t ask. . .)?

No?

Gee, I wonder what it was. . .

On December 20, 2002, Qahtani was taught how to "stay, come and bark".

Fiends!!

The log records that interrogators toughened their tactics in late 2002 after the Pentagon approved harsher techniques.

Toughened? Harsher? What could be worse than doggy school? No - please, no. . .

His questioning often started at midnight. When he dozed off, the hits of Christina Aguilera were piped into the interrogation chamber to wake him up.

Christina? Dear God – have you no pity?

When he threatened to go on a hunger strike and refused to drink, interrogators poured water on his head in a "game" dubbed "Drink Water Or Wear It".

Uh huh? For the ‘wear it’ option, it’s the accessorising I’d be more interested in (like a running threshing machine, dropped from a dizzying height).

Approval for the new tougher tactics was removed in early 2003.

Mercy, at last!

Qahtani is suspected of being the "missing 20th hijacker" from the September 11 attacks.

Is that all? And you made him go ‘woof, woof’ for that? You evil swine!

Television reports are saying it was as a result of a military operation by Iraqi troops. I hope to hear soon that every one of those goat fucking terrorists who abducted Wood were killed.

Wonderful news that he has been released, and that news is made even better in the knowledge that our Government and the Opposition both stood firm and didn't pay those fucking savages one damn cent - unlike some others.

And Doug, once you are back on your feet, you owe those Iraqi boys a beer.

The RCMP and Canadian military believe they've discovered a vital cache of information on Al Qaeda that includes the whereabouts of wanted members and details of attacks on coalition forces in Afghanistan.

The information is allegedly contained in a laptop, dozens of DVDs, audiocassettes and the pages of diaries, seized by the RCMP officers who met Zaynab Khadr at Pearson airport with a search warrant as she arrived back in Canada in February, court documents state.

Khadr is the eldest daughter of a family that has admitted close ties to Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and whose patriarch was once believed to be the highest-ranking Canadian member of Al Qaeda. Her younger brother, Omar, is currently Canada's only known detainee in the American camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Of course she denies the allegations,

Khadr, 25, said in an interview yesterday that anything found on the laptop, except personal pictures and a few "cartoons" that she downloaded, are not hers. She says she bought her laptop second-hand about seven months before coming to Canada. The audiocassettes, described in court documents as providing "significant information regarding 'after-battle action reports' of Al Qaeda and Taliban insurgents" involved in attacking coalition forces in Afghanistan, were found among her father's possessions after he was killed in 2003, Khadr said.

Yeah...of course...silly me. Actually it was one of the Khadr sons, Abdurahman, who back in March of last year said "...we are an al-Qaeda family." See more on that story here. More background info can be found here.

Eight former U.S. ambassadors to the United Nations sent a letter on Tuesday urging congressional leaders to reject a bill that would link reform of the world body to payment of American dues, warning that the legislation could actually strengthen opponents of reform.

The UN groupies cite the following precedence:

The United States is the biggest financial contributor to the United Nations, paying about 22 percent of its annual $2 billion general budget. After the U.S. government fell millions of dollars behind in arrears in the late 1990s, the United States almost lost its voting rights in the General Assembly.

The letter said that withholding money again would "create resentment, build animosity and actually strengthen opponents of reform."

"The fact is reforms cost money and withholding dues impair the U.N.'s ability to make the changes needed," it letter said.

So, let me get this straight: If the US pays up, reform will be had? Really? We've been paying for about 60 years now. Where's the reform? The UN fell from the vision of its founders pretty much as soon as Uncle Joe decided that Eastern Europeans didn't need human rights. "Great Leader" Kim Il-sung had no use for the UN, and the UN participated in the little chaos he started only because the Soviets thought an absence meant a veto, and Uncle Sam led the countercharge. The UN did nothing while Fidel flirted with fortune. The UN stood by while Israel was invaded on more than one occasion, and at every turn denounced Israel for fighting back. The UN did nothing for Afghanistan. Nothing for Tibet. Nothing for Kashmir. Nothing for Northern Ireland. Nothing for anyone unless some plucky nation had the courage to lead, like the Americans in Korea, the Americans in Kuwait, and the Australians in East Timor.

In the mean time, the UN has become a gaggle of goose-stepping anti-Americans, who champion Colonel Qaddafi (yeah, great dictator there, can't even give himself a promotion) to chair the Human Rights Commission, who kick out oppressed Christians when they threaten the facetiously thin skin of Chinese cadres, who equate globalization and Zionism with racism, who think Hugo Chavez is Jesus reborn and Robert Mugabe is the next Nelson Mandela, and who, most egregiously, pass flowery resolutions encouraging Saddam Hussein to come clean, while undermining any effort to actually hold him accountable because too many corrupt officials would then be implicated in the Oil for Food racket.

Diplomacy was always a cynic's game. Americans can appreciate cynicism, but aren't terribly good at conducting it themselves (except, of course, the Democrats). All that the House panel asks is for there to be better accountability and more transparency. These are reforms that make businesses run better, and earn more trust with shareholders. We even demand it of our own governments. (For example, as much as we despise waiting in line at the local DMV, the work pretty much gets done as it should. Why, just last week, I renewed my vehicle license registration online, and already got the new registration card last night.)

By the way, just who are these "opponents of reform" that the UN groupies are pointing to? I imagine some tinpot dictator strutting about, telling his latest mistress that if the damn Yanks don't pay up, then no reform will be had. And if they do pay?, she asks. Jacques laughs: Well, why then we've got the money anyway, so what do we care?

This isn't to say that there aren't worthy branches of the United Nations; but I fail to understand why such things as the General Assembly or the Commission on Human Wrongs is so necessary to continue the good works of UNICEF or maybe even UNESCO. In fact, maybe it's time we broke up "Ma UN" into smaller groups that work better together.

Indeed, to a certain degree, specialists in different international niches have already been around. The International Committee of the Red Cross and Medicins Sans Frontiers already run relief efforts. NATO spearheaded the action in the Balkans. A quickly built coalition was able to coordinate relief efforts in Banda Aceh after the Boxing Day Tsunami. And, not to be terribly morbid, but we don't need a bureaucracy to criticize the US while sparing Third World dictatorships when Amnesty International has made such an art of it, and we don't need UN peacekeepers engaging in lurid acts of sexual predation when various militant groups (such as the Janjaweed) already do it so well. Besides, those blue helmets are just screaming "I'm a target"!

Can the UN be reformed? Sure. Should it be reformed instead of trashed? Probably. But I, the American voter, expect my government to get me a good deal on my international bureaucracy, dammit. So, if we can't split the UN up, how about we just buy different parts of it? If we really want GA membership, we pay for that. If we think UNICEF's good but UNESCO's not, we pay for the first but not the second. Or if they're both good, we pay for UNESCO, a little bit for UNICEF, and wait for those little collection tins to go around at the office for the rest of UNICEF. It'll be like modding a car: You buy the really basic model, and swap out the things you don't like for things you do like.

Ah yes, when was the last time you tried swapping out a bureaucracy, democratically appointed or not?

Twice as long as half of it. What is it about academics who believe that they must have their say on everything even remotely related to their specialised field of expertise. The ADF is on the way out of Timor Leste, after just under 6 years of operations to assist the fledgling democracy to get on it's feet. Dr Michael McKinley of Australian National University feels that forces should have sat around for another 12 months at least. You would of course listen to a man who refers to a country by it's former name, being as politically aware and astute as he allegedly is. Do you want to know the definition of an 'expert'?'X' is utilised in scientific parlance to indicate an unknown quantity, and a spurt is a drip under pressure. Ergo, today's expert is an unknown drip under pressure.

If I could just send a quick shout out to the good Doc? The Ph.D thesis of James Caygill you are supervising called 'Intelligence and the United Nations'. That is usually referred to as an oxymoron.

Dr McKinley says the Australian troops could have stayed for another year. "For the sort of psychological security of the East Timorese and perhaps even as a general message to the residue of trouble making, I thought perhaps Australia might have stayed somewhat longer,"

It's good to know that McKinley feels that the Timorese Defence Force is psychologically insecure. The residue of troublemaking that he refers to will always be there, at least for the short-medium term of 10-15 years. Until the agitators and the Indon military elements of 1999/2000 are moved, retired, expired etc, there will always be the subversives that want to create disharmony and discord. Keeping the ADF in place is like food aid. If they don't take the reins at the first possible instance, they never will. As it is, the mission was originally envisaged to terminate 12 months ago, but bleeding hearts recommended to the UN that it be prolonged another 12 months. Perhaps McKinley could prevail upon other Asian neighbours that are more 'culturally sensitive' to the Timorese to take up Australia's burden and add that little bit of extra psychological comfort.

You would think that an academic would be happy that our troops are returning to Australia, and no longer imposing our belligerence and ignorant ways on the noble savages. The doctor's educational and research interests are diverse. Why, he can expound on a range of subjects at the next faculty knees-up.International Relations, Strategic Studies, Australian foriegn policy, Regional Security.

I wonder what makes McKinley think he should be instructing at the senior thesis level on these subjects? If anyone has a bio of Michael McKinley, feel free to drop the link in the comments.

UPDATE: It seems clear that pet professors Hugh White and Michael McKinley are the media's 'go-to' guys for political commentary. You would think that both of them would have gotten around to getting that Masters of Defence Studies by now.

LOS ANGELES (June 11, 2005) -- Popular search engine Google reversed course late this week and banned a previously approved online ad campaign for a new book that documents abuses of power by Bill and Hillary Clinton. The surprise move prompted the book's author and publishing house to publicly question if the politics of Google's CEO -- a financial backer of Hillary Clinton -- played a role in this change of course.

"Google's decision to reverse its prior approval and shut down this banner ad campaign reeks of political bias," charges Candice E. Jackson, the author of "Their Lives: The Women Targeted by the Clinton Machine" (World Ahead Publishing; hardcover: $25.95; ISBN 0974670138). "The company's liberal leanings are pretty widely known, but this example of blatant editorial censorship is still shocking."

The controversy comes at a time when the search engine giant is facing increasing scrutiny for claims of editorial unfairness by conservative organizations. Last month RightMarch.com, a conservative activist group, went public with claims that Google was rejecting its ads targeting House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi while at the same time running identical ads attacking Republican Leader Tom DeLay.

Representatives for Google -- whose corporate motto is "don't be evil" -- attempted to defend the surprise ban on the book's ads by claiming their policies prohibit ads that are against an individual. But while the ads for the book -- which featured images of the book's cover and pictures of the former First Couple -- were suddenly deemed too offensive, Google happily accepts advertisements with headlines such as "Hate Bush? So Do We," "Bush Belongs Behind Bars," and "George W. Bush Fart Doll."

Even in liberal Northern California, Google is a well-known haven for Democrats. A recent study of Federal Election Commission records revealed that 98% of its employees' political donations (totaling $463,500) went to Democratic political candidates in the past three election cycles. CEO Eric Schmidt is a particularly outspoken Democratic booster. In 2004 he publicly endorsed the Kerry-Edwards ticket, and he is also a financial backer of Senator Hillary Clinton, one of the primary subjects of "Their Lives."

"Hillary Clinton has always been willing to help Bill smear and intimidate the women who got in their way," says Jackson. "And now that she's planning to run for the White House in 2008, I have no doubt that she'll do whatever it takes to keep her past abuses of power concealed. Could the need to protect Hillary's reputation be part of the rationale behind Google's sudden censorship of this advertising campaign?"

Judy Abarbanel, marketing director for World Ahead Publishing, notes that the company's ad campaign for "Their Lives" was receiving hundreds of clicks each day prior to Google's unilateral decision to terminate it. The book's Amazon ranking tumbled several thousand spots in the first day following the termination, costing the publisher an untold number of sales.

"In the past the Clintons have used hired thugs, private investigators, and even the IRS to try to quiet political nuisances," notes author Jackson, who is a recovering victim of rape. "But this is the first time that I've ever heard of a search engine doing their dirty work for them."

About World Ahead Publishing:Headquartered in Los Angeles, World Ahead Publishing is the West Coast's premier publisher of conservative and libertarian books. Our growing coterie of authors share in our pro-freedom editorial ideals, and we seek to appeal to a broad audience by publishing books that advocate the free market, limited government, the protection of liberty through law, and a vigorous national defense.

A Palestinian militant from the military wing of Islamic Jihad movement holds a Koran as he marches during a protest in Jabally refugee camp north Gaza Strip June 10, 2005. Members from the Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement marched through the streets of Jabally after Palestinian accusations that guards had ripped pages of the Koran, while Israeli prison officials said preliminary checks found no evidence an Islamic holy book had been damaged. The allegations that guards tore pages of the Koran during a search earlier this week in Israel's Megiddo prison sparked fury among Palestinians. REUTERS/Ahmed Jadallah

Is this the kind of twisted media reporting the Islamic Thinkers Society alluded to in my previous post? Somehow I don't think so. I don't know what is more comical - the photo of the twit in the mask or the accompanying text by Reuters. I really like the way they refer to Islamic Jihad as a movement. Oh, and don't forget the clown in the mask is a militant and that he represents the military wing of IJ.

These idiots are anything but soldiers. They are pathetic cowards who intentionally murder innocents. And it's organizations like Reuters (notice I didn't use the term news organizations) that give them legitimacy through their continued use of generic terms. A rose by any other name...

By the way Islamic Thinkers Society...next time you throw a hissy fit over twisted reporting, be consistent. You might actually gain an ounce of credibility that way.

Am I missing something here? In NYC, a group of American muslims destroy a US flag while proudly declaring their contempt for America. The group, called Islamic Thinkers Society, declared,

"Oh Muslims! Do you know your enemy? Isn't it obvious?"

"Just to show where our loyalty belongs to Â? you see this flag here? It's going to go on the floor [sic]. And to us, our loyalty does not belong to this flag, our loyalty belongs to Allah ..."

In response to the heat this group of nutbars find themselves in, they had this to say,

WE THE MUSLIMS OF Islamic Thinkers Society ARE AN INTELLECTUAL & POLITICAL NON-VIOLENT ORGANIZATION . AND WE DO NOT HAVE ANY CONNECTIONS WITH FOREIGN ORGANIZATIONS WHATSOEVER.

I'm so ever glad they cleared that up for me. I didn't realize flag burning was an intellectual activity - but then again I don't enjoy their level of mental prowess. They categorically state that they will refuse media interviews because the media in general, and Robert Spencer and Grayson Levy in particular, only twist their words. But what of the video? Did Spencer or Levy twist the video? This from a speaker at the demonstration,

"Islam to dominate over all other religions, to dominate the world, even though the non-Muslims may hate it."

Did either Spencer or Levy intercept that excerpt then re-broadcast it to the crowd? These assclowns can offer up all of the excuses they want. None of them hold any water however. We do not need to hear the words of Spencer or Levy. The words spoken by Islamic Thinkers Society speak loud and clear - and so does the video.

A wonder of the modern age. Google. If you have sufficient time, and inclination, you can find out anything that takes your fancy. Take the Communist Party of Australia, for example. Back to Russia preferably. OK, I guess I'd best explain. First, I spy this story from the ABC about a handful of protestors that attempted to blockade one of the entrances to Shoalwater Bay. 'The Bay' is a major military training area that is being used for a massive joint AUS/US exercise called Talisman Sabre. Now, obviously, the chance to get your face and name in front of the cameras in an age when you are increasingly ignored, marginalised and despised for your beliefs is a chance you can't ignore.

The Communist Party of Australia has taken it upon themselves to raise a pathetic effort to garner attention to their cause. No rationale, no reason. Protest for protest's sake. Fine, I understand their right to protest peacefully, but you've at least got to MAKE SENSE! Here's where it get's interesting in regards to Google. What the ABC failed to elaborate in their story, or perhaps weren't told, or failed to hear, was the protest organiser was El Presidente of the Communist Party of Australia. Now, if that little tid-bit had been included, what chance it would have been news? Even one-eyed ABC lefty journo's know when to pull the plug on rampant idiocy. Usually.

Every time I see reports about some form of governmental protest, I simply Google the protestors if so named, and add it to the list of professional protestors. Hopefully the AFP and ASIO are doing the same. Isn't it strange that if members of the Communist Party protested in China, Russia, beloved Cuba etc, they would be summarily arrested and then "re-educated" in one of Amnesty International's holiday camps (read: Gulag), and yet they blithely expect the full weight of legal protections when disrupting governmental business, and trespassing, creating a public nuisance and other offences. Let's have a look at what the protest organiser has to say about joint military exercises, and see if you can understand the logic of the argument, if any exists.

"We believe that Talisman Sabre military exercises actually stop Australian troops defending Australia and train for us to take American orders in American pre-emptive strikes and coalition wars."

Tough words from Hannah Middleton. So, what of Hannah's background? A cursory Google and Whitepages search turns up the following publicly available information. It's just a matter of joining the dots to build a picture of Hannah Middleton, professional fuckwit. Here's what Hannah's got to say about terrorists and their organisations.

"Someone arrested for some nebulous association with or assistance to a banned organisation would have to prove their innocence. They would have no right to remain silent and could face five years jail for refusing to answer questions."

Perhaps Hannah could explain how the term 'political prisoner' was coined. The CPA's views on terrorist organisations are 'confronting and challenging' to say the least, in particular, the second point.* That the existing criminal law can deal with any acts of terrorism. No new legislation is needed.* There should be no banning of organisations or lists labelling individuals or organisations as "terrorists".* There should be now new powers for ASIO.

Interesting link between Hannah and Shake Al-Hillbilly from 2002. Anyone confused over Al-Hilali's real reason's for going to Iraq recently should be aware that the Hillbilly has actively campaigned against any action to depose Saddam.

"We are delighted that Marrickville Council has endorsed the November 30 Walk Against the War," said Dr Hannah Middleton, spokesperson for the Walk Against the War Coalition. On Tuesday Council endorsed the Walk and directed its staff to widely publicise the event. A banner will also be displayed on the Newtown Neighbourhood Centre.

"We expect that a number of other Sydney local councils will take similar decisions," Dr Middleton said. "Opposition to a war on Iraq and to Australian involvement in it, and support for the Walk is huge and is growing all the time."

Who should be there to provide support at the end? Amongst others, Bishop Power, Sheikh Al-hilali, John Pilger, Iraqi Migrants Council President Kassim Abood, Medical Association for the Prevention of War President Dr Sue Wareham, ACTU President Sharan Burrow, and Rawan Abdul Nabi from the Palestinian community. Isn't it interesting that the godless Commie's and the Sydney Muslim's should announce a protest on a website devoted to Jesus arrival in Jerusalem? The hypocrisy of the fuckwits is staggering.

So if you are interested in contacting Hannah the Commie, feel free to use the PUBLICLY AVAILABLE details that I have merely COLLATED for RESEARCH PURPOSES.

Name: Dr. Hannah MiddletonRole: President of the Communist Party of Australia and various protest groupsAddress: 10/ 23 Stewart St Glebe 2037 (02) 9660 7562 or (02) 9552 2248 or 0418 668 098Click here to see a map of her residence. Not a place for one of the prole's to live, I would suggest, definitely not your typical working class suburb.

Don't call before 9, she's down getting her nails done at the parlour.

This great story came many months ago from a reader of mine identified as AC. Unfortunately as I was swapping over to a gmail account and reorganising things, I missed it until just recently. I did try sending an email but it kept getting bounce backs.

So, if AC is still reading this site, many apologies for the delay.

Now without further ado - here is the story.

There was once a civilization of cats and dogs that had lived together for many years. They learned that war among one another was not the best solution to things, that by combining their civilizations they were able to achieve greater things than they could alone. The cats swift mind and reflexes along with the dogs mean bite and strong muscles were a perfect combination for an advanced society.

The cats and dogs lived together for many years, creating a civilization where all cats and dogs were equal, where each had the right to vote on who would be the pack leader, and the belief that all other animals deserved the same freedom they were experiencing. They also believed that those who did not agree with their way of civilization, had the right to voice their views and that oppression and tyranny, as well as radical dictatorial dogs or cats were not allowed.

Many years had passed by until one day the cats and dogs decided to try and let a new race mix in with theirs, a group of cockroaches. They thought (the cats and dogs), being the kind animals they were, that the cockroaches deserved a better chance in life than lingering in the slimy sewers all day, they offered the cockroaches an opportunity to join a more cleaner society where they were treated just the same as any cat or dog, with the expectation they would provide their labour in employment.

However, sadly to the animals surprise, the pests who called themselves the cockroaches thought they were better than the cats and dogs, and they held huge demonstrations stating that the way the cats and dogs lived were false and that the way of the sewers was the only way in the world (why they didn't just return to the sewers, no one knows).

The cats and dogs, not understanding how the cockroaches could think that a slimy sewer led by dictatorial demi-roaches was something to die for, let the cockroaches voice their views anyway.

Some cats went into the sewers out of interest to see how the cockroaches lived... these cats were killed and mutilated whilst alive in the most vile of ways. Still however, the Cats and Dogs did nothing.

The cockroaches then continued to protest outside of their sewers, in foreign land they were welcomed into.. instead of showing respect they spat in it and praised the great demi-roach that oppressed them.

Many years had passed, and all the while the cats and dogs still did nothing, they believed, even though many of their number had died to murders by the cockroaches, that the cockroaches were still allowed their views and that in the democratic society of the cats and dogs, the cockroaches should not have their rights violated.

The cockroaches then invaded all forms of the animal society in large numbers. With no pesticide to control them as they were meant to be controlled, they claimed many parts of the world as theirs, yet still the animals believed that it was the cockroaches right to do so.

Finally some cats and dogs saw what was happening, and before it was too late they set forth an army to rid society of the cockroaches they had once welcomed.

To the cats and dogs surprise however, millions of cowards among their very own numbers, both cat and dog, rose to the defense of the cockroaches. They claimed that the cats and dogs killing the cockroaches were nothing more than oppressors and that the cockroaches should be allowed to continue to voice their views and be treated the same as any other cat or dog.

It was because of this that the cockroaches were never defeated.. and slowly.. whilst political debates raged between all the animals, the cockroaches nibbled on them softly (including the cats and dogs that stuck up for them), and eventually overtook the great society that was formerly known as the democratic society of animals.

The world was then turned into one big sewer, and at the end of the day, the cockroaches realised all they had gained was greater oppression by their very own vermin. The promise of equality they once had with the cats and dogs was gone as they were wiped by bigger and more crueler roaches, the very roaches they fought to die for.

Though it all made sense to them, for it was all in the name of the demi-roach Allah who promised so many things that never occurred.

For the cockroaches were the muslims, the animals were the civilized world of the West, and the reason the muslims overtook the civilized world was because of those vermin among the animals, the cats and dogs who protected the cockroaches, the fucking leftists who defied their own race for a bunch of worthless foreign insects.

Couldn't have said it better myself, though I do feel a little sad for cockroaches the world over. Not even they deserve to be compared to terrorist scum.

For just as Galloway has called for an alliance between cockroaches and the traitors amongst the cats and dogs, I call for an alliance between all loyal animals to prevent our world becoming one giant sewer.

Leftists are now going to go and cry because I have again said mean things about them and their terrorist allies.

Kym Beazley, 3rd time loser of the federal opposition party, the ALP is known for a number of things. An interesting facet of Big Kym's conversational ability is his affection for sound bites, and making points through stock phrases. One phrase in particular is either deliberately or inadvertently slipped into the majority of his interviews and speeches. What phrase would that be?

Here's Kym discussing leadership issues."I'm enjoying the leadership enormously and the simple fact of the matter is in this business you've got to from time to time run a tough argument, you've got to run an alternative argument to the government."

Kym elaborating on tax policy."But the simple fact of the matter is, I understood when I went down this course that in sharpening the differences between us, that we might well take political water."

Kym outlining the usefulness of the ACTU."The fact of the matter is that the workforce has to see themselves as collectively organised and represented [which] goes way beyond what goes into their back pockets."

Kym on the government's policy in regards to the Medicare safety net. It's a double whammy, very, very exciting."And the simple fact of the matter is they lied. That's the simple fact of the matter."

Kym opines on regional partnership programs."Now, the simple fact of the matter is every element of this program's a disgrace. Every single element of it is."

Simon Crean in 2003 does a Beazley, about Beazley."I would dearly have loved Kim Beazley to have been the Prime Minister now. I did everything I could to ensure that that was the case leading up the last election. But the fact of the matter is we lost. And that's why he's not Prime Minister."

Kym outlines yet another policy failure from 2001. The more things change..."You ask the average Australian if he thinks, he or she thinks that if they get a secure future, or they want a secure future they need to be an educated and innovative society. Well, the simple fact of the matter is that they will say yes. They will say yes to that in huge numbers." [Ed:And they voted against you in about the same amount, anyway, moving on.]

Even previous government ministers are infected with the affliction. Former minister for phone cards, Peter Reith discusses that paragon of political virtue, Cheryl Kernot in Parliament from 1999. Kym was on the front bench then too. It must be the proximity that does it.Mr REITH—"I would be very happy to answer the question, but she was the one who said that a gap had opened up under the leadership of the Prime Minister back whenever it was that she came into the Labor Party. The fact of the matter is, as one of her colleagues said the other day, `Cheryl has become a weight around all of our necks; you never know what she is going to say or do next."

Kym interviewed at a doorstop, October 1999. The fact of the matter is, it's a habit that's apparently hard to break."The door must remain open and the door must be walked through. The simple fact of the matter is this: an Auditor-General's inquiry cannot get into the Minister's office or to the Minister himself."

Kym on after-school care."And that is fine. But the simple fact of the matter is they weren't able to fill the 40,000 places they put in place over the last couple of years."

Kym declares his love of unions again."That is important, but the fact of the matter is that the ability of our work force to see themselves collectively organised and represented goes way beyond what goes into their back pockets. It goes to their very lives."

Kym agrees with the government prior to getting flogged in the 2001 election."The simple fact of the matter is that we are in agreement on what is the appropriate stance for Australia in the contemporary international circumstances."

Kym preaches to the choir over Kyoto, just prior to getting flogged in the 2001 election. Just thought I'd throw that in..."The simple fact of the matter is that a start has to be made if we're to deal with this environmental problem."

Kym predicts the future of the government and privatising Telstra, the government that he lost to in a federal election in 2001. Freudian slip? Bomber's predictive powers seem hazy now."The simple fact of the matter is that Mr Howard will not be Prime Minister if he is elected, at this election, at the time that privatisation falls due."

Kym anoints himself as ALP saviour. Loses to Latham. Suffers being in a party that suffers another election flogging. I dunno, maybe it's Beazley who's the albatross around the ALP's neck?"I've been about seeing a fair go for the new leadership of the Australian Labor Party but the simple fact of the matter is this: we've got Labor governments all around the country. We came very close at the last two federal elections but we're going backwards."

The amount of times that Kym Beazley has uttered the words 'the fact of the matter is' is amazing. Kym subconsciously believes that only he can cut to the heart of an issue. Only his mighty intellect can be brought to the issue at hand, and have it resolved for the little people. The fact of the matter is, he takes the majority of the voting public for fools, and feels he has to explain in simple terms what can often be easily understood. After so long in the public arena, Kym's public speaking experience is still stuck at the awkward older teenage debater stage. Repetition of key phrases, and the injection of key words to create an illusion of knowledge. Rhetoric and monotany of tone and inflection.

Elected officials have no particular skill. It is the ability to craft and deliver ideas, concepts, arguments and ideology that sees the politician retain their position. Kym Beazley may have an outstanding grasp of the political art, although his performance as leader of the ALP would indicate otherwise.

About

This blog is written solely by John Ray, who has a Ph.D. degree in psychology and 200+ papers published in the academic journals of the social sciences. It does occasionally comment on issues in psychology but is mainly aimed at giving a conservative psychologist's view on a broad range of topics. There are very few conservative psychologists. The blog originated in Australia and many (but not most) posts discuss Australian matters. Australians have an unusually good awareness of events outside their own country. Australian newspapers feature news from Britain and the USA not as an afterthought but as a major part of their coverage. So Australians do tend to have a truly Western heart, which is the reason behind the old name for this blog. So events in Australia, Britain and the USA all feature frequently here, plus occasional coverage of other places, particularly Israel.

A primer in American politics for non-Americans:

SCOTUS is the Supreme Court of the United States, the highest court in the land

The "GOP" stands for "Grand Old Party" and refers to the Republican party. The GOP is at present center/Right, while the Democrats have been undergoing a steady drift Leftwards and now have policies similar to mainstream European Leftist parties.

The ideological identity of both parties has however been very fluid -- almost reversing itself over time. In the mid 19th century, the GOP was the party of big government and concern for minorities while the Democrats advertised themselves as "The party of the white man" -- an orientation that lasted into the mid 20th century in the South. The Democrats are still obsessed with race but have now flipped into support for discrimination AGAINST whites.

Was Pope Urban VIII the first Warmist? Below we see him refusing to look through Galileo's telescope. People tend to refuse to consider evidence— if what they might discover contradicts what they believe.

Climate scientist Lennart Bengtsson said. “The warming we have had the last 100 years is so small that if we didn’t have meteorologists and climatologists to measure it we wouldn’t have noticed it at all.”

Some brief observations about Leftism

As a good academic, I first define my terms: A Leftist is a person who is so dissatisfied with the way things naturally are that he/she is prepared to use force to make people behave in ways that they otherwise would not.

Leftists think that utopia can be coerced into existence -- so no dishonesty or brutality is beyond them in pursuit of that "noble" goal

Leftism is fundamentally authoritarian. Whether by revolution or by legislation, Leftists aim to change what people can and must do. When in 2008 Obama said that he wanted to "fundamentally transform" America, he was not talking about America's geography or topography but rather about American people. He wanted them to stop doing things that they wanted to do and make them do things that they did not want to do. Can you get a better definition of authoritarianism than that?

And note that an American President is elected to administer the law, not make it. That seems to have escaped Mr Obama

That Leftism is intrinsically authoritarian is not a new insight. It was well understood by none other than Friedrich Engels (Yes. THAT Engels). His excellent short essay On authority was written as a reproof to the dreamy Anarchist Left of his day. It concludes: "A revolution is certainly the most authoritarian thing there is; it is the act whereby one part of the population imposes its will upon the other part by means of rifles, bayonets and cannon — authoritarian means"

"The arguments for free markets, limited government etc are complicated but correct. The Left have it easy. Their philosophies are simple but wrong. The public grasp simple ideas much more easily than complicated ones" -- Aaron Oakley

Evan Sayet: The Left sides "...invariably with evil over good, wrong over right, and the behaviors that lead to failure over those that lead to success." (t=5:35+ on video)

Some useful definitions:

If a conservative doesn't like guns, he doesn't buy one. If a liberal doesn't like guns, he wants all guns outlawed. If a conservative is a vegetarian, he doesn't eat meat. If a liberal is a vegetarian, he wants all meat products banned for everyone. If a conservative is down-and-out, he thinks about how to better his situation. A liberal wonders who is going to take care of him. If a conservative doesn't like a talk show host, he switches channels. Liberals demand that those they don't like be shut down. If a conservative is a non-believer, he doesn't go to church. A liberal non-believer wants any mention of God and religion silenced. (Unless it's a foreign religion, of course!) If a conservative decides he needs health care, he goes about shopping for it, or may choose a job that provides it. A liberal demands that the rest of us pay for his.

Death taxes: You would expect a conscientious person, of whatever degree of intelligence, to reflect on the strange contradiction involved in denying people the right to unearned wealth, while supporting programs that give people unearned wealth.

America is no longer the land of the free. It is now the land of the regulated -- though it is not alone in that, of course

Envy is a strong and widespread human emotion so there has alway been widespread support for policies of economic "levelling". Both the USA and the modern-day State of Israel were founded by communists but reality taught both societies that respect for the individual gave much better outcomes than levelling ideas. Sadly, there are many people in both societies in whom hatred for others is so strong that they are incapable of respect for the individual. The destructiveness of what they support causes them to call themselves many names in different times and places but they are the backbone of the political Left

The large number of rich Leftists suggests that, for them, envy is secondary. They are directly driven by hatred and scorn for many of the other people that they see about them. Hatred of others can be rooted in many things, not only in envy. But the haters come together as the Left.

Leftists hate the world around them and want to change it: the people in it most particularly. Conservatives just want to be left alone to make their own decisions and follow their own values.

The failure of the Soviet experiment has definitely made the American Left more vicious and hate-filled than they were. The plain failure of what passed for ideas among them has enraged rather than humbled them.

Ronald Reagan famously observed that the status quo is Latin for “the mess we’re in.” So much for the vacant Leftist claim that conservatives are simply defenders of the status quo. They think that conservatives are as lacking in principles as they are.

The shallow thinkers of the Left sometimes claim that conservatives want to impose their own will on others in the matter of abortion. To make that claim is however to confuse religion with politics. Conservatives are in fact divided about their response to abortion. The REAL opposition to abortion is religious rather than political. And the church which has historically tended to support the LEFT -- the Roman Catholic church -- is the most fervent in the anti-abortion cause. Conservatives are indeed the one side of politics to have moral qualms on the issue but they tend to seek a middle road in dealing with it. Taking the issue to the point of legal prohibitions is a religious doctrine rather than a conservative one -- and the religion concerned may or may not be characteristically conservative. More on that here

The Leftist hunger for change to the society that they hate leads to a hunger for control over other people. And they will do and say anything to get that control: "Power at any price". Leftist politicians are mostly self-aggrandizing crooks who gain power by deceiving the uninformed with snake-oil promises -- power which they invariably use to destroy. Destruction is all that they are good at. Destruction is what haters do.

Leftists are consistent only in their hate. They don't have principles. How can they when "there is no such thing as right and wrong"? All they have is postures, pretend-principles that can be changed as easily as one changes one's shirt

A Leftist assumption: Making money doesn't entitle you to it, but wanting money does.

"Politicians never accuse you of 'greed' for wanting other people's money -- only for wanting to keep your own money." --columnist Joe Sobran (1946-2010)

I often wonder why Leftists refer to conservatives as "wingnuts". A wingnut is a very useful device that adds versatility wherever it is used. Clearly, Leftists are not even good at abuse. Once they have accused their opponents of racism and Nazism, their cupboard is bare. Similarly, Leftists seem to think it is a devastating critique to refer to "Worldnet Daily" as "Worldnut Daily". The poverty of their argumentation is truly pitiful

The Leftist assertion that there is no such thing as right and wrong has a distinguished history. It was Pontius Pilate who said "What is truth?" (John 18:38). From a Christian viewpoint, the assertion is undoubtedly the Devil's gospel

"If one rejects laissez faire on account of man's fallibility and moral weakness, one must for the same reason also reject every kind of government action." - Ludwig von Mises

Because of their need to be different from the mainstream, Leftists are very good at pretending that sow's ears are silk purses

Among people who should know better, Leftism is a character defect. Leftists HATE success in others -- which is why notably successful societies such as the USA and Israel are hated and failures such as the Palestinians can do no wrong.

A Leftist's beliefs are all designed to pander to his ego. So when you have an argument with a Leftist, you are not really discussing the facts. You are threatening his self esteem. Which is why the normal Leftist response to challenge is mere abuse.

Because of the fragility of a Leftist's ego, anything that threatens it is intolerable and provokes rage. So most Leftist blogs can be summarized in one sentence: "How DARE anybody question what I believe!". Rage and abuse substitute for an appeal to facts and reason.

Their threatened egos sometimes drive Leftists into quite desperate flights from reality. For instance, they often call Israel an "Apartheid state" -- when it is in fact the Arab states that practice Apartheid -- witness the severe restrictions on Christians in Saudi Arabia. There are no such restrictions in Israel.

Because their beliefs serve their ego rather than reality, Leftists just KNOW what is good for us. Conservatives need evidence.

“Absolute certainty is the privilege of uneducated men and fanatics.” -- C.J. Keyser

"Almost all professors of the arts and sciences are egregiously conceited, and derive their happiness from their conceit" -- Erasmus

THE FALSIFICATION OF HISTORY HAS DONE MORE TO IMPEDE HUMAN DEVELOPMENT THAN ANY ONE THING KNOWN TO MANKIND -- ROUSSEAU

"Seest thou a man wise in his own conceit? there is more hope of a fool than of him" (Proverbs 26: 12). I think that sums up Leftists pretty well.

Eminent British astrophysicist Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington is often quoted as saying: "Not only is the universe stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we can imagine." It was probably in fact said by his contemporary, J.B.S. Haldane. But regardless of authorship, it could well be a conservative credo not only about the cosmos but also about human beings and human society. Mankind is too complex to be summed up by simple rules and even complex rules are only approximations with many exceptions.

Politics is the only thing Leftists know about. They know nothing of economics, history or business. Their only expertise is in promoting feelings of grievance

Socialism makes the individual the slave of the state – capitalism frees them.

MESSAGE to Leftists: Even if you killed all conservatives tomorrow, you would just end up in another Soviet Union. Conservatives are all that stand between you and that dismal fate.

Many readers here will have noticed that what I say about Leftists sometimes sounds reminiscent of what Leftists say about conservatives. There is an excellent reason for that. Leftists are great "projectors" (people who see their own faults in others). So a good first step in finding out what is true of Leftists is to look at what they say about conservatives! They even accuse conservatives of projection (of course).

The research shows clearly that one's Left/Right stance is strongly genetically inherited but nobody knows just what specifically is inherited. What is inherited that makes people Leftist or Rightist? There is any amount of evidence that personality traits are strongly genetically inherited so my proposal is that hard-core Leftists are people who tend to let their emotions (including hatred and envy) run away with them and who are much more in need of seeing themselves as better than others -- two attributes that are probably related to one another. Such Leftists may be an evolutionary leftover from a more primitive past.

The American Psychological Association is generally Left-leaning but it is the world's most prestigious body of academic psychologists. And even they (under the chairmanship of Ulric Neisser) have had to concede a large gap (one SD) in black vs. white average IQ.

Leftists seem to believe that if someone like Al Gore says it, it must be right. They obviously have a strong need for an authority figure. The fact that the two most authoritarian regimes of the 20th century (Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia) were socialist is thus no surprise. Leftists often accuse conservatives of being "authoritarian" but that is just part of their usual "projective" strategy -- seeing in others what is really true of themselves.

"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here. For roughly two centuries now, antisemitism has, throughout the Western world, been principally associated with Leftism (including the socialist Hitler) -- as it is to this day. See here.

Leftists call their hatred of Israel "Anti-Zionism" but Zionists are only a small minority in Israel

Some of the Leftist hatred of Israel is motivated by old-fashioned antisemitism (beliefs in Jewish "control" etc.) but most of it is just the regular Leftist hatred of success in others. And because the societies they inhabit do not give them the vast amount of recognition that their large but weak egos need, some of the most virulent haters of Israel and America live in those countries. So the hatred is the product of pathologically high self-esteem.

"With their infernal racial set-asides, racial quotas, and race norming, liberals share many of the Klan's premises. The Klan sees the world in terms of race and ethnicity. So do liberals! Indeed, liberals and white supremacists are the only people left in America who are neurotically obsessed with race. Conservatives champion a color-blind society" -- Ann Coulter

Who said this in 1968? "I am not, and never have been, a man of the right. My position was on the Left and is now in the centre of politics". It was Sir Oswald Mosley, founder and leader of the British Union of Fascists

The term "Fascism" is mostly used by the Left as a brainless term of abuse. But when they do make a serious attempt to define it, they produce very complex and elaborate definitions -- e.g. here and here. In fact, Fascism is simply extreme socialism plus nationalism. But great gyrations are needed to avoid mentioning the first part of that recipe, of course.

Politicians are in general only a little above average in intelligence so the idea that they can make better decisions for us that we can make ourselves is laughable

A quote from the late Dr. Adrian Rogers, 1931–2005: "You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it."

A lesson in Australian: When an Australian calls someone a "big-noter", he is saying that the person is a chronic and rather pathetic seeker of admiration -- as in someone who often pulls out "big notes" (e.g. $100.00 bills) to pay for things, thus endeavouring to create the impression that he is rich. The term describes the mentality rather than the actual behavior with money and it aptly describes many Leftists. When they purport to show "compassion" by advocating things that cost themselves nothing (e.g. advocating more taxes on "the rich" to help "the poor"), an Australian might say that the Leftist is "big-noting himself". There is an example of the usage here. The term conveys contempt. There is a wise description of Australians generally here

Heritage is what survives death: Very rare and hence very valuable

Two lines below of a famous hymn that would be incomprehensible to Leftists today ("honor"? "right"? "freedom?" Freedom to agree with them is the only freedom they believe in)

First to fight for right and freedom,
And to keep our honor clean

It is of course the hymn of the USMC -- still today the relentless warriors that they always were.

If any of the short observations above about Leftism seem wrong, note that they do not stand alone. The evidence for them is set out at great length in a MONOGRAPH on Leftism.

You can email me (John Ray) here (Hotmail address). In emailing me, you can address me as "John", "Jon", "Dr. Ray" or "JR" and that will be fine -- but my preference is for "JR"

There are also two blogspot blogs which record what I think are my main recent articles here and here. Similar content can be more conveniently accessed via my subject-indexed list of short articles here or here (I rarely write long articles these days)